JAMES BOND STUFF

There’s a story that has received very little publicity, with a lot of unanswered questions, even though it sounds like something out of a James Bond movie. It must have caused a huge diplomatic incident between Canberra and Moscow but the Foreign Affairs Department doesn’t want to talk about it. Our ambassador to Moscow, Les Rowe, was beaten up, bashed almost unconscious, possibly drugged, and for hours went missing in St. Petersburg.

The injuries were so serious that Mr. Rowe was medically evacuated to London for treatment.
 
Admittedly, all this happened five years ago, in January 2005, and later that year Mr. Rowe retired.  It was never made public, although obviously gossiped about in diplomatic circles, until The Age newspaper broke the story this week.
 
It came out while questions were being asked about recent death threats in Moscow towards veteran Australian journalist John  Helmer. DFAT has told him his life is at risk but won’t tell him how or by whom.
 
This is the little we know about the intriguing Rowe affair. As I said, Foreign Affairs doesn’t want to talk about it and neither does Les Rowe.
 
The Ambassador went to St. Petersburg for official engagements. For some reason there was confusion as to where he was actually staying. Sources told The Age ‘the ambassador went off the radar for hours’. A dangerous thing in a country where even post-KGB Russian spy agencies know everything.
 
When finally found in a hotel Mr. Rowe was badly injured, was nearly unconscious, possibly drugged by whomever attacked him, and was taken to  a St. Petersburg hospital.  Canberra organised his evacuation to London.
 
Russian police investigated the incident but we don’t know if anybody was ever charged.
 
A lot of questions remain. We don’t know who was with Les Rowe that night?  Was he slipped a Mickey Finn? Sounds like the Rolex gang. Was he somewhere he shouldn’t have been? And why the secrecy?
 
One suspects the Russian spy agency FSB knows all about it. And to make it even more interesting a senior Australian consular official in St. Petersburg denied to The Age  that any attack ever happened even though Canberra has confirmed it.  
 
Very interesting.
 
Wednesday, January 27, 2010

© Copyright Derryn Hinch 2010